Jul 9, 2018

THE GREAT LEVEL - Stella Tillyard

Stella Tillyard’s latest historical novel transports us to England in 1649, where Jan arrives from Holland to work on draining the Great Level, an expanse of marsh in the heart of the fens. Here he meets Eliza, whose love forces him to see the world differently. The book then takes the reader, along with its main character to the New World, where Jan’s skills as an engineer are needed.

The Great Level is a dramatic and elemental story about two people whose differences draw them together then drive them apart.

For the jacket we wanted to suggest travel and distance, as well as an obvious indication of the period and setting. The front of the jacket uses intricate embroidered foliage from a mid seventeenth-century curtain, with interwoven details of a compass and ships from the period. The back depicts a wet and earthy, ambiguous lowland landscape which could be either the Old World or the New. In reality, the brooding landscape is a photograph of Welches Dam, in the Cambridgeshire Fens.

The two sides of the jacket are brought together by the fine gold foil ‘rays’ eminating from the compass on the front.

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